Grants for Artists

(Individuals, Collaborations, or Collectives)

These grants support artists (individuals, collaborations, or collectives) to develop their practice. Among other activities, the grants can be used to pursue threads of research, stage an event, make new work, publish, travel, take part in a residency or workshop, or present an exhibition or performance. The grants can cover part or all of the proposed activity or project. Approximately ten grants are awarded each calendar year, with an average value of US$5000. Applications are due twice per year, on April 1 and October 1, and results are communicated within four weeks of these dates. Mophradat’s staff work with two or more external advisors to select grant recipients. The advisors’ names are published after grant recipients are announced.

Eligibility Criteria

Applicants must come from the field of contemporary arts (all disciplines are welcome).

Applicants must be primarily engaged with artistic concerns and aim toward high artistic merit.

Activities or projects can take place anywhere in the world, but must be by artists or arts practitioners from or living in the Arab world, and/or engaged with the Arab world.

The proposal must be achievable and completed within twelve months of the grant submission deadline.

Applications to attend degree-based study programs (such as MAs or PhDs) are out of the grant program’s scope and will not be considered.

Application Form

Applications must include a completed application form and relevant supporting materials.

Only completed PDF application forms with supporting material uploaded through the submissions page will be accepted.

The application form is best completed using Adobe Acrobat Reader.

Process

All applicants, whether selected or not, receive a response to their applications.

Due to the high volume of applications and the confidentiality of the selection process, Mophradat does not provide individual feedback explaining the reason an application was not selected.

If selected, a grant agreement will be signed between the recipient and Mophradat.

Funds will be released in a two-stage process: 80 percent when the grant agreement is signed, and the remaining 20 percent on project completion.

A narrative summary of what was achieved must be submitted by the date included in the grant agreement before the second installment is made.

*By applying for a grant, you agree that if you are selected, you will endeavor to realize your proposal. If the proposal is not realized to an appropriate level of completion, you may be asked to partially or fully reimburse Mophradat.

Mophradat’s homepage hosts an editorial project that publishes new and existing texts related to contemporary art practices and the languages used to discuss them. Over the coming months, the art collective Nile Sunset Annex (NSA) has been commissioned to be our editorial voice. NSA selects an art-related word each month that has a twist when translated between Arabic and English, and are finding, creating, or commissioning a text in both languages that relates to the selected word. NSA’s process is intended as self-educational and the glossary, rather than being prescriptive, will question the terms and their uses in both languages. As NSA describes, “the conversations that arise in attempts to find common ground or agree on the significance or etymology of certain words can be a space of potential.” NSA is working on this glossary with translator Ziad Chakaroun.

Nile Sunset Annex (NSA) primarily functions as an art space that puts on monthly exhibitions of artists’ work in a spare room in an apartment in Garden City, Cairo, but it also acts as a publishing house, a contemporary art collection, an archivist, an artist, an author, a bartender, a curator, and an installation team. Founded in January 2013, NSA is still evolving.

Untitled: upturnedhouse was initially shown in New York, where it was installed in a very ad hoc way. This process had to be radically changed when it was agreed that it would be shown in the Carnegie. All its failings exploded into reality. The challenge was to retain its haphazard character, but to construct it as a permanent object. It was as if my love of the conflicting nature of making and un-making were being meticulously scrutinized as a badly told lie — I felt like a criminal whose devious activities were on trial. It was all for good, though; I have been giving my ways of making and un-making a tougher, mental acknowledgement. My works are now being shown more than once — something I do not have much experience with, since in the past my works have been shown and then destroyed, with some materials being salvaged for future use. Making more permanent works has made me more resilient and purposeful about my building and re-building methods. It can be gruelling, and yes, the resulting works are hard won, not necessarily always in a good way. I’m still hanging onto an uneasy relationship with whether the works are ever finished or not, because it generates excitement and uncertainty. I never know if more should be added or removed. I don’t doubt what I am doing, but I want the freedom to change my mind and to be able to undo today’s job tomorrow, regardless of whether it turns out well or badly. I want a fluid thinking process to be realized in the material reality of the work itself, to try and narrow the gap between thought and action.

Phyllida Barlow, in conversation with Vincent Fecteau in Bomb Magazine.